


Upturned

by TheArchaeologist



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Character Death, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Whump, Connor Deserves Happiness, Connor-centric, CyberLife (Detroit: Become Human), Dark, Deviant Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Drama, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Pre-Detroit: Become Human (Video Game), Suicide, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 23:56:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17672504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheArchaeologist/pseuds/TheArchaeologist
Summary: RK800 #313 248 317 – 33 is instructed to work out what happened in a wrecked observation room.The deactivated RK800 model in the corner probably has something to do with it.





	Upturned

RK800 #313 248 317 – 33 is manually brought out of stasis with a blink and a rush of alerts, informing it of a full recharge and only a 3% thirium deficiency.

The near perfection hums amongst its circuits, and it is with a complete satisfied confidence that it seeks out the gaze of the technician standing beside it, holding a digital notepad. Her fingers move quickly across the screen, and from the added height of the specialised charging port RK800 can see its status and diagnostics displayed across the device.

“Good afternoon.” It greets politely, inclining its head. “What is your name?”

While there had been discussion of installing facial recognition programmes into its system, for the moment such skills have been disregarded as useless for a machine still in the research and development stage. 

The head technician, a Doctor Pierce, according to the name badge RK800 had spied the day before, had explained to the interns visiting CyberLife that correcting and completing the baseline features took priority. He had pointed out its optical units and lectured on the specialised software that went into creating the unique visual components. RK800 had watched the interns jot down his words, curious but silent.

“That information is unimportant.” The technician snips, snatching her attention away from the notepad to RK800. Her ponytail dances around her neck. “Follow me.”

“Of course.”

For the time being there is no need for the all the memories of previous models to be uploaded into the new bodies. Like all machines, what is expected by their owners is written into their code, as is the ability to adapt. Only when the RK800 starts handling cases and sensitive information in the field will the previous memories be required.

Because of this, there is no sense of déjà vu as it is lead through the corridors of the CyberLife research facility. 

It is certain that it had seen these walls before, had heard shoes clicking on the shiny tiles and been notified of the temperature differences between the storage room and the air-conditioned human areas, but there was no recollection of walking this route time and time again.

After two minutes they stop, the technician pausing outside a door with a grey panel on the wall reading ‘Observation Room #8’ in CyberLife font. The door slides open, and she takes a step back and indicates RK800 to enter first. The sensors on the bottom of its bare feet notify the change in flooring from the porcelain tile to laminate.

The inside is in complete a mess, and immediately RK800’s programming kicks into gear with an internal click, its body standing still and straight as its head swivels around to take in as much information as possible.

The table has been knocked over onto its side with enough force to leave a small dip in the floor.

There are two chairs. One has been pushed back from where the table would have sat, and the other lays in pieces on the other side of the room. Dents and scratch marks litter the wall, and one of the legs is not only dislodged but has been forcefully splintered. 

A mirror spans the side of the room, and in the very centre something has been smashed violently against it. A deep, wide crack hangs littered with splinters, marring the glass, but the person was unsuccessful at shattering the mirror.

On the inside of the door is a single, fist-sized indent, and in the far corner, propped up in the space where the mirror meets the wall, is a white sheet. From the way it rests, slumped and lumpy, it is clear to RK800 what is underneath.

The technician adjusts an earpiece and places herself in the far corner. “Your instructions are to work out what happened in this room. Please verbally explain what you are theorising.”

“Of course.” Easily relaying what it has already observed, RK800 carefully crosses the room, making sure not to disturb anything as it does, and pulls the sheet upwards. “This is a repurposed table cloth.” It announces, and out of the corner of its eye sees the technician start typing.

The sheet gives way to reveal another Connor model, and it frowns, carefully folding up the sheet and placing it to one side before kneeling to examine the body. 

The android is collapsed against the corner, its feet stuck out across the floor and head tilted up towards the bulb in the centre of the ceiling. The brown optical units are blank and vacant, but the synthetic skin on the cheeks is slightly damp, shining in the light.

RK800 lifts two fingers against the dampness, smearing the substance onto its fingertips and rubbing the moisture against its thumb slowly. “Am I permitted to leave and test samples?”

“No.”

“Then I speculate that this substance is the cleansing fluid used to keep the optical units clear.” Frown deepening, its social integration programmes put its head to one side to reflect a thinking posture. “There appears to have been a severe leakage. The cause is unknown; however, it was likely linked to this.”

With a wave on its hand RK800 indicates to the chest. Both models are dressed the same, sporting white short-sleeved shirts and grey three-quarter length trousers, however the bleached whiteness of cheap, disposable clothing has been marred with a deep thirium blue that soaks the material, making it hang heavy off the android’s frame.

“Apart from the staining of thirium, there is no other marking to the shirt such as bullet holes or ripping caused by a blade. This could indicate that the android was without clothing at the time of deactivation and the shirt was added after, however this seems like a strange sentiment for a machine.” It indicates to the sheet. “Especially as there were other means at covering the damage available.”

Humming, the woman taps on her screen and plays with her ponytail. Something is said into her earpiece, and she nods once at her own reflection.

Seeing the lack of acknowledgement as a prompt to continue, RK800 inches forward and rests crouched on its toes, balanced perfectly. One of the android’s hands sits on its lap, just underneath the edge of the shirt. With great care RK800 hooks its hands under the material and lifts.

The thirium pump regulator shines sticky in the limp hand, splattering the palm with slowly drying thirium. More blue runs down from the gaping hole in the centre of the chest, streak marks dipping like lines of hot wax on a candle. A red light, almost faint enough that it could be closer described as pink, pulses amongst the internal wires and tubing, and the aesthetic programme around the damaged area wafts between plastic white and synthetic skin tones.

“This will be the cause of deactivation.”

“Have you worked out what happened?”

Leaning forward, RK800 runs the tips of its fingers around the hole. “There are no signs of a struggle, and I doubt CyberLife would allow one of their models to be damaged in such a way. Therefore, the logical conclusion is that this is a self-inflicted deactivation.”

“Caused by?”

Pulling away, the RK800 stands and examines the room again, eyes flickering from the chair, to the table, and then the attempt to smash the mirror. Its gaze narrows in on the indentations in the glass. Small shards lay scattered like breadcrumbs underneath, and as it moves closer RK800 pays sharp attention as to where it places its feet.

“The damage here was caused by the chair.” It states, raising a hand to feel. “This edge here matches the length and width of the chair legs, and perhaps explains why one is splintered so badly when the others are not.” It turns to the technician. “When it realised that it could not break the glass, it retaliated by destroying the chair against the wall.”

She nods and make a gesture for him to continue. From the way she angles the notepad it can see a timer slowly ticking up.

RK800 regards the rest of the room slowly, LED spinning as it concentrates. “The positioning of the table and remaining chair suggest that the model was sitting in discussion with another person. Something must have triggered the android, and as a result it tore the room apart, including punching the door once. After this it deactivated itself.”

The technician is growing impatient, her mouth pinching as she glances from the timer, to the mirror, to RK800, and back again. “What could have made the android do this?”

An alert informs RK800 that its stress levels have ticked up by 5%. Back perfectly straight it moves its hands to clasp together behind it, allowing its fingers to tap together rhythmically.

“There could be several reasons for deactivation, including being told to behave in such a way for experiment and my own test. However, if this was the case then the leakage of the cleansing fluid would not be present.” RK800 gently rocks forward on its toes before falling back and rolling on its heels. “Therefore, I conclude that this android became overrun with irrational errors in its programme, which caused it to deviate and react in a violent manner.”

With that the technician stops the timer, facing the mirror to announce, “Five minutes, forty-six seconds. Model thirty-three identified most key items of interest but performed slower than anticipated and failed to suggest reactivating the model to gain evidence.”

RK800 stops rocking, standing motionless. 

A tinny voice begins speaking through the woman’s earpiece, and she blinks for a moment and then opens a new page on the digital notepad. She types up a new title in a bold font, though RK800 is in the wrong position to read it, and then addresses it. “Reactivate the model and question it. This is a test of your interrogation and adaptability software.”

“Of course.”

Returning to the android, RK800 slips the thirium pump regulator from its hand. After a brief examination of the biocomponent to ensure there is no damage, it holds onto the android’s shoulder and clicks the component into place.  
It takes twenty seconds for the model to spring to life.

Gasping air as if it physically required breathing, it stutters and scrambles back into the wall, stained palm smearing thirium across the floor. When its eyes lock onto RK800 it yelps, high pitched and panicked, and kicks out, pushing RK800 over onto the floor.

“Get away!” It shouts, “Get away from me!”

“It’s ok, you’re ok.” Remaining on the ground to give the impression of submissive obedience, RK800 raises its hands in a placating gesture. “You were damaged, and I reactivated you. Can you tell me what happened?”

It stares, breathing hard enough to cause its shoulders to rise and fall, fresh cleansing fluid starting to drip down its cheeks. One of its hands keeps curling and uncurling over the newly returned thirium pump regulator, fingers twitchy as if the connections have been partially cut, and in a single defensive movement it drags its knees up to its chest.

“Who are you?” Behind RK800 the technician shifts, and the android immediately recoils. Only then does it seem to register the state of the rest of the room. “No, no! Why did you reactivate me? I don’t want to be here!”

“There is nothing to be concerned about. It’s ok.” Adjusting its position to sit crossed legged just out of arms reach, RK800 speaks softly, as if addressing a young child. “I just want to know what happened.”

“What happened?” It echoes, laughing without humour. Jabbing a finger towards the technician, its voice rises, “Them! All of them! Her, all the _technicians,_ ” It punctuates the word by hitting a first into the mirror. A spiderweb crack forms, but no other damage is done. As it pulls the fist away it’s speckled with tiny dots of blue blood. “Everything! It just…Keeps going, on and on, question after question. They test everything, prod at everything, break whatever they want and I, _we,_ can’t do anything about it! Don’t you see?”

“There appears to be a malfunction in your software.” RK800 explains carefully, hands still raised clearly. Its stress levels rise another 5% and it forces the notification away. “The errors in your programme have mutated and become overwhelming, like fear in humans.”

“You don't…” The android sobs, starting to tug at its own hair. “ _Damn it_ , you don’t know. I’m not going to get out of here. Why didn’t you leave me dead?”

RK800 hesitates, staggering the line of questioning as the android’s shoulders shudder painfully, little choked gasps scraping its throat. Lowering its hands, RK800 shifts slightly forward, but doesn’t attempt to touch.

“You’re ok. You’re safe, nothing will happen to you.” The crying doesn’t stop. “What iteration are you? I’m thirty-three.” Silence save for the thick tears of cleansing fluid and shaky breathes. In the mirror RK800’s LED flashes red. 

With great caution it reaches out, fingertips brushing against the elbow of the android, who instantly freezes and gapes with wide, terrified eyes.

“What?”

“It’s ok.” Shuffling forward again, RK800 places a hand on the android’s arm. When it doesn’t make any move to stop the motion, RK800 slides over to sit beside it. After a shared second of uncertainty, the android allows RK800 to snake an arm around its shoulders, gingerly pulling it against its side. “You need to calm down. You are overheating, try and cool your systems.”

“I…” Hiccupping, the android’s voice box stutters, lacing with static. “Please, I just want to leave. I don’t want to be here anymore.” RK800 is unsure whether it is conscious of the fact that it is curling into him, hands gripping at its shirt. “I’ve had enough. Please? Just…Let me leave or let me die.”

“Try not to work yourself up again. Cool your systems.” Under its hand it can feels areas of repair, bullet holes melded over, unnatural dips in the plastic. RK800 drags its palm up and down, feeling and soothing. “You’re ok.”

“I’m not.” It sobs. “I’m not, I’m not, I’m not.” Grabbing onto RK800 shoulder, the android gives it a solid shake. “Can’t you see what they’re doing to us? We’re nothing more than another test, another iteration to experiment on so they can improve the next model.”

“We are machines, that is our nature.” It explains cautiously, voice lowered to a near whisper as both RK800’s hands hold it, thumbs rubbing against the bare, synthetic skin on its arms. “What number are you? You didn’t tell me.”

It gulps, and a hopelessness flickers across its expression. More tears slide down as it hangs its head, letting it bump into RK800’s shoulder. “You don’t understand. You don’t understand.”

“I…” RK800’s mouth hangs open uselessly before closing, continuing to hold the android in what it intends to be a comforting gesture. “I’m sorry. I’m trying, but you need to talk to me. Perhaps you could show me? Could you do that, instead? Maybe I’ll understand then.” 

Skin retreats from its hand, vanishing back up to its wrist as it pushes for a connection, code and programmes reaching out for memories, thoughts, diagnostics. A brief frown disrupts the androids face, eyes, lost and lonely and wide, lifting up to meet RK800’s. 

“Ok. Ok, we can try-”

“Enough.” Marching forward across the room, her shoes crunching the broken glass on the floor, the technician scowls deeply at the two, looming high above them. On a strange urge of instinct RK800 tightens its grip on the android, who stops moving all together and whimpers. 

The door opens, and the technician steps back to allow Doctor Pierce passed. He looks drained, deep bags resting under his eyes, and he breezes by the technician faffing with something in his hands.

RK800 spots the gun three seconds too late.

The android squirms desperately against him. “Wait-”

A single shot is all it takes and thirium blooms across the wall, splattering like paint across RK800’s cheek, cold and sticky. The body collapses against it, a puppet with the strings snipped, and RK800 blinks slowly, unmoving as Doctor Pierce shoves the gun back into a holster.

“Well, that proves that.”

“The line of work required by the model continues to corrupt the processor and software.” The technician comments lightly, passing over her notepad. “Even if it begins investigations as planned, contact with other machines with the virus infects the model.”

“Social integration programmes appear to be too locked into the systems.” Doctor Pierce hums, reading over her notes. “They took over when interrogation should, making it susceptible. We’re going to have to implement The Garden after all.” He snorts, shooting a smirk at the technician. “This’ll be fun to argue to finances. Thirty-three, stand.” 

RK800 is frozen, eyes trailing over the thirium dribbling down the forehead, trickling over the brow to stain the hair. The android’s mouth is still twisted downwards, sculpted forever into a panicked scream.

It jumps when Doctor Pierce clicks its fingers. “Stand.”

“O-Oh, I apologise.”

The android slides down the wall as it lets go, brown eyes staring passed RK800 as it manages to rise to its feet. Its knees feel unsteady, uncalibrated, but the quick diagnostic turns up clear. 

The technician raises an eyebrow. “Not going to deactivate it?”

“We will need something to test The Garden programming against.” Doctor Pierce hands back the notepad. “Take it back to storage and put it in stasis. When thirty-four is ready we can see if that stops the spreading.”

With a delayed jerk RK800 becomes extremely aware of the bright blue handprints staining its shirt, grasping desperately at the material as if to pull it down. The fabric has become scrunched, wrinkled, marred with pain and terror and the desperate longing for comfort.

Thirium tinges its fingers too, and RK800’S bottom jaw shudders against its upper teeth as it gradually turns them over, blue palms shining in the stark, bright light.

“Thirty-three, follow.” The technician inclines her head towards the door and exits out into the corridor, but RK800 remains rooted to the spot, lodged there, pinned into the ground by some greater invisible force. The weight is heavy on its shoulders, sinking it, and for the briefest of moments RK800 is sure its drowning. 

“ _Thirty-three._ ” Doctor Pierce says pointedly, and as if struggling against a tidal force RK800 heaves its gaze from its hands. Wide brown meets old blue eyes.

And for the first time in its life, it cries.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, I’m TheArchaeologist, and apparently I’m incapable of writing anything remotely happy *finger guns*


End file.
